Surround Sound

[Murrdawg045]

I have heard conflicting arguments on whether or not you can have surround sound on an svcd. I've searched the forums and they all say different things, but the one thing I could not find was whether surround sound was possible on miniDVD. I would think it would be, but how would I do it? Do I need to do anything special in the ripping process, DVD2AVI process, TMPGEnc process, or burning process? Thanks.

[Stansell]

It all depends on the definition of "surround sound".

The older - pre-digital matixed surrounds sound - generally called "Dolby Surround" can be stored in any stereo track. The surround information for the rear channel (only one) is mixed in with the left and right analog audio signal. The center channel is also derived from the left and right signal by a Dolby Pro-Logic decoder. Any stereo audio source can contain this type of surround (VHS HIFI, TV, Cassette, CD). Nothing special is needed to capture or copy it. Because of this, it will be in the stereo sound of an SVCD or VCD if it was in the original source.

The more modern surround sound systems contain 5.1 individually encoded audio tracks. This is generally in the form of a Dolby Digital audio track. Other 5.1 formats include DTS or MPEG audio (rare)

To reproduce the 5.1 channels in a Dolby Digital surround track, you would need to copy the Dolby Digital bit stream to your SVCD disc. As far as I am aware, SVCD does not support Dolby Digital audio streams, and so generally, most Dolby Digital streams are converted down to a Dolby Surround mix for the SVCD.

As far as miniDVD goes, you shoud be able to have a Dolby Digital surround sound track on the disc. The disc is recorded the same as a DVD, but on a CD-R.

I don't know all the specifics for ripping a Dolby Digital sound track for a miniDVD, but the trick would be to not re-encode the Dolby Digital sound track and to maintain the original bit stream. You would also need a DVD writing program that supports Dolby Digital audio, and most lower cost ones don't. The only one I am aware of that will is SpruceUP which can no longer be purchased. A trial version is still available for download though.

[vitualis]

As above.

In summary for VCD:
Dolby Surround: YES (i.e., you need a Dolby Prologic decoder)
Dolby Digital 5.1 (AC3): no
DTS: no

In summary for SVCD:
Dolby Surround: YES
Dolby Digital 5.1 (AC3): no
DTS: no
Multichannel MPEG audio: technically yes (in the specs but good luck making it or even finding a player + digital receiver that makes it work)

Regards.

[Murrdawg045]

Thanks to both of you for the great info

[Nelson37]

THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU - for the clearest and most informative info I have seen on this subject. The first paragraph about encoding Proligic was what I have been missing. I could not find out if I needed to do any further processing to maintain "surround sound" on my TV captures.

That post should be nailed to the FAQ.

I capture from digital cable, which sometimes shows a Dolby Surround 5.1 screen before the movie. Is this still Prologic, needing no further work, or is this a better signal which should be downmixed to Prologic at some point? Can I even capture a true 5.1? Just got a SBLive with Digital In, but I have no Digital Out on my cable box, just stereo and coax, there are three jacks labeled High Speed (?), Out of Band, and R (remote?) Does my cable box downmix to Prologic, assuming there is no Digital Out?

OKAY, I will RTFM on that one. Assuming I CAN get a Digital Signal to the SBLive, should I treat the resulting MPG as containing an AC3 file, or what? Any info greatly appreciated.

Side question, as I have not yet purchased the rear and center speakers, how good IS Prologic and is it worth the effort (and the purchase of the speakers)?

[fyreboltx2]

Hi,

I'm sorry if my questions are in the wrong section but...
I was wondering, if there was a way I could convert .wav audio into Dolby Surround for a VCD? If so, how can I get TMPGEnc to not convert it to MPEG audio when I'm converting the audio and video files into VCD compatable MPEG files? I'm not an audio expert so please dont make fun of me if my questions are dumb...

[Kdiddy]

I was wondering, if there was a way I could convert .wav audio into Dolby Surround for a VCD?

http://www.doom9.org/audio-guides.htm

If so, how can I get TMPGEnc to not convert it to MPEG audio when I'm converting the audio and video files into VCD compatable MPEG files?

What are you asking??...to convert you audio into mp2 for VCD/SVCD usage with a an outside audio cnvertor, therefore not using TMPG's interanl encoder. If so, link provides answers.

If you are under the impression tha you can not get regular Dolby Surround from mpeg audio, you are wrong, you can. See previous posts above.

[fyreboltx2]

I ment if I did convert a .wav file in a Dolby Surround file (whatever type that may be) is it possible for TMPGEnc to leave it as is. As I've said before, I'm not an audio expert. Actually I know next to nothing about audio related stuff...

UPDATE:

Thanks for the help Kdiddy. I now have .aac file but I can't load it up on TMPGEnc...

Vitualis said that Dolby Surround is possible with a VCD... how? I'm sorry if I missed but this is like a new language for me!!!

[Kdiddy]

Well there is no such thing as a "Dolby Surround File", Dolby Surrond a.ka. Dolby Pro-Logic, is a decoding process done by your receiver. The Dolby Surround information is decoded from a regular stereo file. That stereo file can be in any form. For usage with VCD/SVCD, the form of audio has to be mpeg2. TMPG can easily accept the wav file and encode into the proper stereo mpeg2 file. However, if you wish, you can use an 3rd party audio encoder to do this as shown in the links above I posted.

[Stansell]

I capture from digital cable, which sometimes shows a Dolby Surround 5.1 screen before the movie. Is this still Prologic, needing no further work, or is this a better signal which should be downmixed to Prologic at some point? Can I even capture a true 5.1? Just got a SBLive with Digital In, but I have no Digital Out on my cable box, just stereo and coax, there are three jacks labeled High Speed (?), Out of Band, and R (remote?) Does my cable box downmix to Prologic, assuming there is no Digital Out?

OKAY, I will RTFM on that one. Assuming I CAN get a Digital Signal to the SBLive, should I treat the resulting MPG as containing an AC3 file, or what? Any info greatly appreciated.

Side question, as I have not yet purchased the rear and center speakers, how good IS Prologic and is it worth the effort (and the purchase of the speakers)?

Hi Nelson,

You cable box probably only puts out the Dolby Surround mix - which is what you want for your Video CD's.

Some of the movie channels and pay per view channels do send out Dolby Digital 5.1 audio, but it is up to your cable system or satallite provider to actually send them to you. I used have digital cable and the box didn't even have S-Video out - much less Dolby Digital. I now have a DirecTV with Tivo and it does have Dolby Digital out. To see if your box puts it out, look for a connector that says "digtial out". It will either be a coaxial or optical connector.

That being said, again, even if your box has a connector for digital audio out, it is up to your cable company to provide you the signal. For instance, even though I have digital out on my DirecTV box, only a few of the channels actually carry a 5.1 signal. I used to have the Showtime package, and only the main Showtime channel, and perhaps one other output Dolby Digital. The rest were just Dolby Surround which can be obtained by just recording the stereo sound.

Now, supposing you do have a digital output, and you hava a channel that broadcast 5.1 digital audio, actually capturing that audio is another chapter. I don't have a Dolby Digital in on my sound card, so I'm not sure if it is possible to capture the dolby digital signal with your video captures. Someone else here may know more about that and I leave that to them. But again, even if you did capture the Dolby Digital signal, you can't put it on a VCD or SVCD and it would be difficult getting it to cDVD. You are better off just capturing the Stereo output of your box which will contain the Dolby Surround (Pro-Logic) mix.

Should you get front and surround speakers? Absolutely. Espeically if you have a Dolby Digital reciver. Movies will sound so much more alive. But even with Pro-Logic it is well worth it. You'll find it adds to the movies, TV Shows (heck even commercials) that you watch on cable or VCD. Remember, most the moves from Star Wars until Jurasic Park came out were in Dolby Surround. It does a good job with what it has.

The main advantage to a center speaker is that all the dialog comes from the location of the TV. This is important when you are sitting a bit off-center from the TV.

For my system, I have a nice pair of JBL stero speakers which I've owned Since 1991. When I moved up to surround sound, I added a JBL surround package with one center speaker and two rear speakers. My reciever allows me to specify the size of the speakers so it sends all the bass to the two main speakers (kind of like having two sub-woofers). I plan on adding a sub-woofer to my system for those real-low rumbles that music speakers just weren't designed to reproduce.

Perhaps I should write a "Surround Sound" How-to.

[fyreboltx2]

Thanks Kdiddy. I finally understand what your trying to say!

[Lars17]

Hmmm... Sorry for just jumping into this thread all of sudden, but I have a question that I have to get an answer to:

When you've converted the wav-file into an aac-file... How do you use that aac-file in tmpgenc? Whenever I try to load the file I get an error saying that the format is not supported... Is there anyway of solving this? I saw that fyreboltx2 asked the same question, but no one really answered...
If you're not able to use the aac-file when using tmpgenc, I can't really see the use in converting the files at all...
If there really is an easy solution to this problem, I'm sorry, but I've never been in contact with the aac-format before, so I don't really know anything about it... Except the fact that I can't load it into tmpgenc... (=¤^_^¤=)

I hope someone can help me out here...

[Kdiddy]

Why are you converting the .wav file to an .aac file. If your end goal is to make a VCD/SVCD, your audio has to be mpeg2 audio. So input the .wav file into TMPG and skip the converting to .aac file step altogether.

[fyreboltx2]

I think he might be thinking the same thing I was thinking in the first place. I didnt know it was possible to get surround sound from an mpeg audio file but later found out it was. He tryed to load the .aac file into TMPGEnc because he's trying to get surround sound that way... Lars thats not possible.